


up in the night

by prettyaveragewhiteshark



Category: Horizon: Zero Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Comfort/Touch, F/F, Fluff, No Spoilers, aloy is gay and she was in love with vala and you can fight me on that, kiss, spoiler-free
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-22
Updated: 2017-03-22
Packaged: 2018-10-09 07:54:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10407405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prettyaveragewhiteshark/pseuds/prettyaveragewhiteshark
Summary: A little one-shot between Vala and Aloy, the night before the Proving





	

The fire in the hearth was dimming, filling the lodge with warmth and casting a deep orange glow through the darkness. The only sound was the peaceful breathing of the other Proving contestants. Aloy’s bed of furs and feather-stuffed pillows was the most comfortable she’d ever laid on. She’d never been more wide awake in her life. 

She lay on her back as was her habit, one hand behind her head, staring up at the darkened ceiling above. Everyone else had a bunkmate, but apparently no one wanted to share close quarters with the outcast. It was just as well - sleeping beneath a too-close canopy would’ve made her claustrophobic. Sleeping indoors with a host of other bodies was unsettling enough as it was. All that on top of the Proving that loomed just a few dark hours away, and the thoughts of Rost turning endlessly through her mind served to keep her more alert than if she were hunting a Thunderjaw. 

If she could, she would’ve left the lodge, wandered the trails outside Mother’s Heart, let the cold night air clear her senses and soothe her nerves. But she knew the guards were standing watch outside the door, ready to catch any contestant who lost their nerve in the night and tried making a break for it to avoid the Proving. She was as good as trapped until sunrise. 

She sat up, rolling silently from her cot. If she couldn’t leave, at least she didn’t have to lay here all night, restless and wakeful. She padded across the lodge floor to the fireside. A few stools had been placed there and she sat, picking up a poker and stoking the fire a little to wake the flames. The glow and the warmth was familiar, shining in her eyes, making her cheeks warm. It wasn’t the same, but it reminded her of nights with Rost, sitting in comfortable silence around their campfire while the moon rose. 

Rost. A pang touched her heart as she thought of him, of their last moments together. His rejection of her proposal to meet after she won the Proving stung. Didn’t he want to see her anymore? Why wouldn’t he agree to let her look for him? But, Aloy reminded herself, he was a man of the law, and a stubborn one at that. Of course he’d turn down any idea that even hinted at a violation of Nora customs. Something about what he’d said troubled her, though, how he promised she’d never find him again. Surely he knew she’d come looking, and relentlessly too, but he seemed so certain that he’d be unreachable even with the help of her Focus. 

A wave of loneliness swept over her. Never in her life had she been surrounded by so many people as she was now, but with the thought of losing Rost she’d never felt more alone. A spark of defiance kindled in her chest, igniting determination and stubbornness. No, she’d find him. He could run and hide, foolish old man, but she’d never be too far behind. She’d tell him about her victory at the Proving and though he wouldn’t reply she’d see the pride in his dark eyes. 

A sound behind Aloy startled her from her thoughts and she was on her feet in a flash, turning to face the sound, fire poker in her hand, forgetting for a moment entirely that she was safe in a lodge and not surrounded by herds of machines in every direction. Vala stepped into the light, her hands up, a wary look in her eyes but a small smile on her lips. 

“Easy,” she murmured. “It’s just me.”

Aloy lowered the poker sheepishly, coming back to herself. 

“Sorry,” she said, lowering herself to the stool again as Vala sat beside her. 

“Don’t worry about it,” Vala said. “I’m sure you don’t get too much friendly company where you’re from.” 

Aloy shook her head. “Not exactly, no.” She glanced over at Vala, taking her in for a moment, marveling at the beauty of her dark skin, her eyes that were blacker than midnight but that still held so much kindness. 

“You couldn’t sleep either?” Aloy asked. 

Vala shrugged. “Not really, but it’s nothing new. Rest is always a distant friend the night before a fight or a hunt.”

“What was that you said about being well-rested before you ran me into the ground?” Aloy teased. 

Vala chuckled quietly, looking over at Aloy, meeting her eyes. “I can run you into the ground well-rested or no.”

“I guess we’ll see,” Aloy replied, but her boast was tempered by the distracted tilt in her voice. 

Many moments of silence passed before Aloy realized she’d been looking into Vala’s eyes for a long time. She glanced away, into the fire, clearing her throat quietly. She felt Vala watching her still. 

“Is it strange, being here?” Vala asked. 

“Yes,” Aloy said, recalling the noise and chaos of the crowd in Mother’s Heart earlier that day. “It hasn’t been so bad, I’m just not sure how to handle humans. Machines and animals are predictable, but people? They’re an entirely different challenge.”

“I think you’d find that to be true even growing up around them,” Vala laughed. “Sometimes I wished to be an outcast, just to escape it all for a while.”

“Well aside from the freezing winters, rabid machines, and occasional unpleasant encounters with Nora citizens, it’s not all bad,” Aloy said musingly. She touched the scar on her forehead left by Bast’s rock years ago. “Some unpleasant encounters are worse than others, though, let me tell you.”

Vala’s brow puckered slightly, disgust touching her eyes. “Bast has bragged about that since the day it happened. He’s the worst of the Nora, despicable in every way.” She let out a huff of breath, the sound just short of a laugh. “But I’ll never forget the terror in his eyes when you knocked that rock from his hand. He felt the fear of All Mother that day. And I always wanted to meet you after it happened, to thank you personally.”

Aloy laughed, dropping her head. “Believe me, it was my pleasure.”

Vala took her right hand, holding it as though it were a trophy. “This is it, this is the hand that brought down Bast’s pride for a day. A feat worthy of the gods.”

Aloy felt herself blushing, and she couldn’t tell if it was because of the praise or if it was the warmth of Vala’s touch. Vala was smiling, lowering Aloy’s hand, laughing, but not letting go. Aloy felt her heartbeat speed up a little. She couldn’t meet Vala’s eyes so she watched her fingers instead, blinking as she took in the sensation of being touched like this, as she processed the comfort of the feeling. 

Rost had touched her before, of course, when he would grab her to remove her from the path of danger or help her wash a wound. When she was younger he had held her when she had nightmares, but never for very long, and as she grew older he stopped giving her physical comfort entirely. She’d never questioned it, and she’d never realized how much she’d craved it until just now, here in the warmth and soft light with Vala holding her hand, fingers now grazing her skin gently, her black eyes gentle as she traced a slow pattern along the vein in Aloy’s wrist. 

“I thought of coming to you,” Vala said, not looking at Aloy. She said it like a long-held secret. “I got older and knew that men repulsed me and none of the girls my age felt anything the way I did. I thought of coming to you and…” She paused, laughed quietly. “I don’t know. I just wanted to meet you, to see if the girl with the hair of fire had survived all these years.” Vala looked up, then, meeting Aloy’s eyes. Aloy felt captured, helpless in a way she didn’t mind.

“I’d hoped you’d be here,” Vala said. “For the Proving. I knew it was a long-shot, since outcasts rarely make their way back to Mother’s Heart. I told myself if you didn’t come here, after the Proving, once I was a Nora Brave, I’d find you like I’d always wanted to.”

“Well,” Aloy said, her mouth disconnected from her mind. “I suppose I saved you the journey.”

Vala smiled a little, but it faded quickly and the expression left behind was unfamiliar to Aloy, but not unwelcome. Vala leaned a little closer, hesitated a moment, then closed the distance between them and pressed her lips to Aloy’s. This close, she smelled like pine and dirt, like home. Aloy let her eyes drift shut. Vala’s lips were not sweet and they were not bitter, they were strange and good and somehow familiar. Vala touched Aloy’s cheek with such tenderness Aloy felt like she would shatter. 

Then Vala pulled away. Aloy couldn’t open her eyes for a long moment, but when she did Vala was smiling at her. Aloy felt a little dizzy, a little drunk, a little strange and hot and her heart was racing. She thought she should speak, but she didn’t know what to say. Vala seemed to see it, and she seemed to understand. She gave Aloy’s hand a small squeeze before releasing it.

“Goodnight, Aloy,” she murmured, then she stood and turned and disappeared into the shadows of the lodge, climbing back into her bunk. 

Aloy stared into the dark for a long while. She touched her lips absently, feeling a small, bewildered smile grow there. She closed her eyes, turning back to the fire. The smell of pine lingered. Aloy knew she wouldn’t be getting any sleep tonight. 


End file.
